Last month, I drove down West Confederate Ave and was surprised to notice a small road off to the right which I hadn't noticed on any of my other 20 or 30 drives down that road. I pulled in and read the monuments. They were for Union sharpshooters who were engaged there, behind the enemy lines, on July 3. Does anyone have more information on this ? It was the first time I'd heard any reference to this.

There was a small Federal force from Sickles's Third Corps in that area in the late morning of 2 July. Four companies of the 1st US Sharpshooters and the 3rd Maine (maybe 300 men in total) moved west of the Emmitsburg Road, then north toward Spangler's Woods around noon. There they ran into the 8th, 10th and 11th Alabama of Wilcox's brigade, who pushed them back toward the Peach Orchard in relatively short order. Both the sharpshooters and the Maine men were acting as skirmishers in front of Sickles's main position along the Emmitsburg Road when McLaws's division attacked later that afternoon.

On 3 July both the sharpshooters and 3rd Maine were in reserve behind Sixth Corps troops along the southern end of Cemetary Ridge, and moved north to support the Second Corps (after the Pickett/Pettigrew/Trimble assault).

Earlier today I came across more information about these sharpshooters while looking at a book about CW weapons. Yes, the monuments I saw must be from Berdan's regiment. The book said that July 2, at Gettysburg, was the first chance he had to "show what his men could do." He had financed his own regiment and provided them with Colt 50-caliber Sharps, open-sight, breech-loading rifles. According to the book, the sharpshooters "repelled a much larger force of Confederates for a crucial 20 minutes...a delay which gave Union defenders valuable time to reinforce critical points on their line." It also said that, "the battle in Pitzer's Woods showed that a few men armed with breechloaders could be more than a match for a far larger force armed with old-fashioned muzzleloaders."

Those reenacters are there every year at "Pitzer Woods" where the recently placed Longstreet Monument is..I also talked with some of these guys on top of Little Round Top and when questioning them down the guy told me that his company was posted there and that of course the guys that fell back out of Pitzer Woods was part of the same unit. Anybody got any real facts on that? I dont recall ever reading that they were a part of the Little Round Top assult but that is what this guy claimed. He also claims that at least 80 percent of the reenactors of the Berdan Sharpshooters are actually decendents of the original Sharpshooters...This guy was really up on his History of the Berdan Sharpshooters and all his equipment he had there also. But still not sure about the Little Round Top episode..Anybody?

Thanks for the information on that Johan. May have to study up on these guys a little more at Gettysburg. So it seems the guy actually did have the right information. On most of the books I have read on Gettysburg it just has not come up in that material.

The 2nd Us sharpshooter Regt ws deployed by a fence by the slyder farm and skirmished with elements of hoods division (probably Laws men I think). They fought a fighting withdrawal until they reached little round top where some of them formed with Chamberlains 20th Maine's company B (Merril ) on the left .